With a budget wedding template you’ll be able to make a financial plan for your wedding much more easily. After all – you don’t want to be overwhelmed during the last weeks before the wedding and after your honeymoon, when all the bills start coming in.
What should your wedding budget be?
First of all – we can’t look into your wallet and bank account. So don’t take this personal. But most people that search for a wedding budget are looking to spend around 30000 USD, according to a 2018 survey.
This is the USA average however. Note that other countries can be a lot different, for example in China they cost around 12000USD and in the UK it’s around 30000 Pounds.
How should I budget a wedding?
You should budget a wedding like you budget a project. That means you need to start early (as early as possible) and you need to PLAN. Planning means – how much will be able to save (and spend) realistically and in what season do we want to do it.
Furthermore you need to use as many references as you can to do your actual budgeting. Don’t just guess on the price of an event location or a photographer, check out prices on websites and ask people that recently got married. But also – call up some venues to see which dates are more expensive than others and whether they have discounts available depending on the group size.
Finally it helps if you keep good records of your wedding budget. Use a wedding budget template (see below) and keep it current, by continuously updating it with new costs and estimates.
How do I plan a wedding on a low budget?
Not everyone can fly to Hawaii for a sunset wedding on the beach and a 5-star reception at the Ritz. But then again – not everyone wants that either!
Low budget weddings are not only more affordable, but they can also fit you more. By including only those people you truly want and by not overspending on a ridiculous venue, you can get close to a budget that you can actually afford. That way you can pay for a down payment on your new house instead!
Further below we listed some of the best cost saving tips we’ve found on the web.
What are the typical costs of a wedding?
A wedding is an event that incurs a lot of different costs. You’ll find all of them nicely categorized in our wedding budget templates below. Here are some of the main categories of typical costs for a wedding:
- Apparel: the wedding dress and all other clothing and outfitting you require
- Reception: the reception is a sub-event that incurs a lot of its own costs, such as the venue fees, the music, the cake etc
- Flowers: flowers can be very pricey and take a lot of time to select
- Photographer: not only does this category cover the person taking the photographs (and videos), but also the albums
- Rings: a small category, but definitely a very costly one!
- Ceremony: similar to the reception category, this is a sub-event with a lot of different costs
- Stationary: invitations, thank you notes etc
- Rehearsal dinner: the 3rd sub-event of your beautiful wedding day
- Honeymoon: don’t spend all on the wedding in case you want this category to have a decent budget!
- Other costs: gifts, marriage license, make-up, tips etc
Free Printable Wedding Budget Templates (PDF and Word)
We have made a selection of Wedding Budget Templates in PDF or Word form in case you prefer to have a printable format. This will help you sit together and do it with pen and paper and that can be more quicker sometimes.
The only disadvantage of not using our Excel templates (see below) to do your wedding budget planning, is that you need to all the costs manually.
Free Wedding Budget Spreadsheets (Excel)
Below you’ll find some of the free Wedding Budget Excel spreadsheets we found for you. While most are set to dollars (USD or CAD), you’ll find that occasionally a template can have a different currency. If you still like the layout then please use Excel’s Find/Replace function to adapt the spreadsheet.
How do I cut wedding costs
Weddings can be VERY pricey. It’s pretty standard that costs run in the thousands with many couples spend upwards of 25000USD and quite a large percentage even over 50000USD.
It IS your special day of course so you’ll have a lifelong of reminiscing over it, so spending money is definitely worth it. But it doesn’t hurt if you can cut a bit – right?
Here are 10 saving tips that you can use to save on your wedding budget.
- Do paperless invites.
In this day and age people don’t expect paper mail so much anymore. As beautiful as a real card may look – sending emails for RSVP is a LOT cheaper. You can easily spend 100s of dollars doing this and for 99.9% of your guests this will perfectly fine. And for your grandparents? How about paying them a visit to invite them personally! In that way you get to see them AND invite them and it’s time well spent! - Use referral discounts.
Did you hear that DJ play at your cousin’s wedding and you liked him? Ask if he’ll offer a referral discount! The same for the photographer that your best friend was using at her wedding! This easily saves hundreds of dollars AND it saves you a lot of time searching for good people! - Don’t pay for a choreographer for your first dance.
Do it yourself with YouTube instead! YouTube is an infinite resource nowadays and it’s so much more fun than having someone continuously correct you. This saves you 800-1000USD easily! - Reuse the bouquets for centerpieces!
Enough said – no need to throw them away, but use the brides’ and bridesmaids’ bouquets for your centerpieces. Good for the environment and for your wallet! - Get dresses on black Friday!
Discounts for your bridesmaids dresses (or even your own dress) can really go a long way. Black Friday discounts or other discounts (is there a store closing down?) can really be huge! - Haggle!
No need to pay full price on everything. If you take several things at the same supplier – ask for a discount. Hell, ask for a discount ALWAYS! - Be original
Don’t splurge on a location like the Ritz or the Wyndham. Go for an original location instead! Not only is it much more personal – it’s usually much cheaper as well. You’ll have a wedding that’s unique AND more affordable. - Use a family ring
Instead of going overboard on a diamond ring from Tiffany’s – consider using an heirloom instead. Very personal and classy! - Invite fewer people!
Quick reminder: the wedding is for YOUR enjoyment. It may not be for that “friend” that you haven’t talked two in three years or that nephew that you only see on your uncle’s birthday, but hasn’t spoken to you for the last 10 birthdays. Being polite is great, but think about who you want to share that special day with! - Buy shoes you can reuse!
This may be more a “guys” tip than the others, but for men shoes can often be reused for work purposes or other “dress” occasions. Be sure you buy shoes that you can reuse. That way you can go to the office in style once in a while!
Lastly – we want to leave you with a great YouTube video on how to save on your wedding budget. This is one of many, so YouTube searching may be another tip we didn’t mention!
